https://phys.org/space-news/planetary-sciences/ en-us Planetary science and exoplanets exploration news stories and features from Phys.org Japanese scientists are readying a mission to Mars' moons to retrieve samples that may unlock the origins of the solar system and life on Earth, although a rival Chinese mission aims to make it back first. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-japan-aims-moons-mars.html Planetary Sciences Sun, 16 Aug 2026 15:05:17 EDT news706111469 Neptune's moon and ring system stand out among the giant planets because of the strange imbalance between its one very large moon and its many tiny moons. Its largest moon, Triton, makes up more than 99% of the mass of all satellites orbiting the planet while orbiting retrograde compared with Neptune's rotation. The predominant theory is that Triton is a captured Kuiper Belt object that caused a major disruption in Neptune's early moon system. Now, a new study published in Science Advances provides spectroscopic evidence to support this theory. https://phys.org/news/2026-07-neptune-tiny-moons-story-triton.html Planetary Sciences Sat, 15 Aug 2026 11:20:01 EDT news704628891 Using unique equipment installed on NASA's WB-57 aircraft flying above heavy clouds off the coast of Iceland, a Southwest Research Institute-led team successfully observed a total solar eclipse on Wednesday. The high-altitude jet followed the moon's shadow at 50,000 feet (15,000 meters) to take measurements of the solar corona in nine different wavelengths, ranging from visible to infrared light. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-airborne-observatory-views-solar-corona.html Space Exploration Fri, 14 Aug 2026 18:40:03 EDT news705938400 Long before dark sunspots appear on the sun's surface, a new active region—where powerful solar eruptions can originate—begins showing subtle signs of its formation. Now, researchers say a new artificial intelligence model can detect those early signals and forecast the emergence of solar active regions nearly nine hours in advance on average. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-ai-hidden-solar-eruptions-hours.html Planetary Sciences Fri, 14 Aug 2026 09:00:01 EDT news705840421 What do you do when the observation you need comes around once a year? Well, preparation is key, but this is the awkward truth about finding another Earth. When a planet crosses the face of its star, a sliver of starlight passes through its atmosphere on the way to us, and the gases there absorb their own particular colors. Read the spectrum carefully and you can list what the air is made of: oxygen, ozone and water vapor, the things that would make you sit up. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-telescope-array-earth-exoplanet-atmosphere.html Astronomy Thu, 13 Aug 2026 17:40:01 EDT news705854101 For decades, astronomers lumped brown dwarfs into a single category defined by mass alone—too big to be classified as planets but too small to become stars. However, this definition ignores the two very different mechanisms that can form them: the direct collapse of gas clouds and formation within the accretion disks of massive stars. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-tess-rare-brown-dwarf-orbiting.html Astronomy Thu, 13 Aug 2026 17:00:06 EDT news705841178 Detecting water where none remains today: Neutron and X-ray tomography make it possible. In an international study conducted with the participation of the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI, researchers have brought to light macroscopic hydrogen-rich regions inside a Martian meteorite. The findings provide evidence for early water-rock interactions on Mars. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-dry-meteorite-mars.html Astrobiology Thu, 13 Aug 2026 15:00:01 EDT news705841861 A popular myth about black holes is that they act like giant cosmic vacuum cleaners, sucking in everything around them. But Wladimir Lyra's research found a new mechanism around supermassive black holes that is more like a cosmic nursery, giving birth to planets more massive than Jupiter. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-supermassive-black-holes-massive-planets.html Astronomy Thu, 13 Aug 2026 09:11:08 EDT news705831033 The building blocks of rocky planets may have begun forming just 100 million years after the Big Bang—long before the first galaxies even existed—according to new research from the University of Portsmouth. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-supernovae-seeded-rocky-planet-blocks.html Planetary Sciences Wed, 12 Aug 2026 17:20:03 EDT news705757021 To date, close to 30,000 satellites have been launched into Earth's orbit, leading to mounting concerns over the debris created when they collide. In a new analysis posted to the preprint server arXiv, Hugh Lewis of the University of Birmingham shows that satellite constellations can grow so large that they cross a critical size beyond which they generate unstable, runaway amounts of debris. The findings point to an urgent need for tougher rules on which satellites are allowed into orbit in the first place. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-satellite-constellations-spiraling-space-debris.html Space Exploration Wed, 12 Aug 2026 15:00:08 EDT news705747610 There is a question that often comes up at every public talk I do, and I have never had a good answer to it—well, not an entirely confident one. What's inside a black hole? The textbook reply is a singularity. Cross the event horizon, and everything falls inward to a point of infinite density where our equations return nonsense. It isn't so much an answer as an admission that we've run out of physics. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-star-black-hole.html Astronomy Wed, 12 Aug 2026 14:00:07 EDT news705757321 Most people underestimate how much light a pair of sunglasses blocks out. A typical dark pair removes around 80% to 90% of the visible light reaching the eye. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-enjoy-solar-eclipse-safely.html Space Exploration Wed, 12 Aug 2026 11:41:08 EDT news705753619 The surface of the moon is a bleak and forbidding place that could be hiding a lot of water ice within its dusty landscape. However, most possible ice deposits don't just stand out in an image. Scientists need specialized mapping to find those deposits, so they have devised another way to find the moon's frosty hidden reserves. They use seismic waves from moonquakes as locator beacons. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-moonquakes-reveal-lunar-ice-future.html Space Exploration Wed, 12 Aug 2026 08:40:05 EDT news705735495 The habitable zone concept is useful for understanding which worlds might, possibly, maybe, be habitable. It highlights exoplanets at the right distances from their stars for liquid water to potentially exist on their surfaces. But that alone can't determine habitability. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-mission-evolution-exoplanet-atmospheres.html Astrobiology Tue, 11 Aug 2026 21:00:01 EDT news705685681 Most current space activities operate close to Earth in what is called near–Earth orbit. However, as more satellites and other infrastructure begin to extend beyond that region, maintaining situational awareness of those objects will be crucial. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-smarter-track-satellites-earth-orbit.html Space Exploration Tue, 11 Aug 2026 09:00:05 EDT news705657422 For decades, astronomers have assumed that the Martian surface froze solid around 3 billion years ago and has stayed that way ever since. If this were really the case, any liquid water would have long since either been locked away underground or lost to space. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-mars-liquid-thought.html Astrobiology Mon, 10 Aug 2026 17:00:13 EDT news705587200 Hundreds of Venus-like planets could soon help determine why some worlds become sweltering greenhouse hellscapes while others remain capable of supporting life. But before answering that question, scientists first need to know how fast those planets are spinning. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-planets-hellish.html Astronomy Mon, 10 Aug 2026 10:00:01 EDT news705573181 Boston College scientists have determined that a newly discovered meteorite from Mars is 1.27 billion years old and derived from a previously unsampled, pristine source on the Red Planet. The study is published in the journal Geochimica et Cosmochimica Acta. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-rare-mars-meteorite-billion-year.html Planetary Sciences Sun, 09 Aug 2026 10:20:01 EDT news705310410 What shape is an asteroid? For (44) Nysa, the honest answer until now has been that nobody knew. It is one of the brightest and largest E-type asteroids in the main belt, a class with a surface rich in enstatite, and its oddness has made it a favorite target for well over a hundred years. Successive observations hinted that it was elongated, perhaps even two lumps stuck together, but the picture stayed frustratingly blurred. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-asteroid-worlds.html Space Exploration Sun, 09 Aug 2026 06:40:01 EDT news704978242 Within our solar system, Uranus is a geometric oddball. Its spin axis tilts more than 90° from its orbit, so it essentially rolls on its side through space. In contrast, Earth and other planets tilt only moderately or not at all. What's more, the ice giant's magnetic field is strangely offset and tilted another 60°. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-uranus-unusual-rotation-day.html Planetary Sciences Fri, 07 Aug 2026 12:20:05 EDT news705316681 On Mother's Day weekend in May 2024, Earth experienced its most powerful geomagnetic storm in two decades, spawning auroras—the ribbony bands of light in the nighttime skies in the Northern and Southern hemispheres—that may have been among the strongest displays on record in the past 500 years. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-physicists-solar-outbursts-historic-mother.html Astronomy Fri, 07 Aug 2026 09:00:04 EDT news705227342 A team of astronomers using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) has captured a massive stream of gas—one trillion miles, or 0.2 light-years, long—feeding the young triple-star system GW Orionis. These new observations provide the clearest evidence yet for how such "streamers" can tilt and twist the disks where planets are born. The findings are published in The Astronomical Journal. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-trillion-mile-gas-streamer-tilt.html Astronomy Thu, 06 Aug 2026 17:00:07 EDT news705248521 Deep inside super-Earths—rocky planets with masses between 1 and 10 times that of Earth—high pressure can cause familiar minerals to take forms rarely seen on Earth. Understanding more about the temperature and pressure conditions in which these phases are reached could help researchers learn more about how planets evolve. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-super-earths-solid-deep-mantles.html Planetary Sciences Thu, 06 Aug 2026 15:20:03 EDT news705240721 High-energy particles in Earth's radiation belt can appear to spread out randomly, even when they are moving in a "predictable" way. This is because spacecraft observations naturally blur the fine-scale structure of the particle population, a new study reveals. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-spacecraft-conceal-particles-earth-space.html Astronomy Thu, 06 Aug 2026 09:20:06 EDT news705226201 This composite of seven images from the Mastcam-Z instrument aboard NASA's Perseverance Mars rover shows Earth, visible as a small bright dot moving from upper left to lower right, passing behind the Martian moon Phobos on July 2, 2026, the 1,907th Martian day, or sol, of the mission. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-nasa-perseverance-captures-phobos-earth.html Astronomy Thu, 06 Aug 2026 09:20:05 EDT news705219842 A new study led by Southwest Research Institute (SwRI) provides evidence that liquid nitrogen is rising to Pluto's surface through cracks at the northern edge of Sputnik Planitia, part of the massive heart-shaped glacier on the dwarf planet's surface. This is the first evidence of liquid flow occurring recently on Pluto. The study is based on data from NASA's New Horizons spacecraft and led by SwRI Associate Vice President Dr. Alan Stern, the principal investigator of the New Horizons mission. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-liquid-nitrogen-pluto-heart-glacier.html Planetary Sciences Thu, 06 Aug 2026 09:00:05 EDT news705225241 Venus may be overwhelmingly inhospitable today, but many planetary scientists believe that it wasn't always this way. Billions of years ago, some observational evidence suggested that our planetary neighbor may have looked far more like Earth, complete with oceans potentially capable of harboring life. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-venus-polygonal-plains-watery.html Astrobiology Wed, 05 Aug 2026 08:00:09 EDT news705070220 Scientists plan to use a total solar eclipse that will be visible in Spain next week as a rare chance to learn more about the stormy, unpredictable nature of our star. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-total-eclipse-scientists-chance-probe.html Planetary Sciences Wed, 05 Aug 2026 07:00:02 EDT news705116543 Using continuous imagery from NASA's PUNCH (Polarimeter to Unify the Corona and Heliosphere) mission, scientists predicted the near-Earth arrival of a solar eruption to within 30 minutes in an initial proof-of-concept test. The results, presented Tuesday at the Committee on Space Research Scientific Meeting and under review at the journal Space Weather, could revolutionize the way Earth-impacting storms are forecast. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-nasa-sharpens-solar-storm.html Astronomy Tue, 04 Aug 2026 17:10:03 EDT news705080161 The space around Earth is becoming increasingly crowded, with thousands of satellites and pieces of debris now sharing low Earth orbit. Even above this region—at altitudes of several hundred kilometers—the extremely thin upper atmosphere can slow satellites, making accurate information on atmospheric density essential for predicting satellite motion and preventing collisions. https://phys.org/news/2026-08-upper-atmosphere-starlink-satellite.html Astronomy Tue, 04 Aug 2026 15:10:02 EDT news705074281